FPL players to avoid in Gameweek 1: the 2026/27 trap picks
Most Gameweek 1 content right now is a team reveal. The drafts have converged so hard that the same fifteen names keep coming back, and the more interesting videos this week were the ones going the other way: not who to pick, but who to get out of your team before the deadline.
Here is what the community has been flagging, and where it disagrees with itself.
The five names getting called out
One dedicated trap list this week named five players, ordered by how likely you are to already own them.
| Player | Flagged because | Ownership |
|---|---|---|
| Dominic Solanke (£6.0m) | Ankle injury that may cost him the rest of pre-season, with Richarlison in line to lead the line instead | not given |
| Iliman Ndiaye | Heavily linked with a move away, and question marks over penalties even if he stays | 15% |
| Ezri Konsa | No attacking threat, Villa defenders rarely pick up defensive contribution points, and Arsenal plus Man City inside the opening eight | not given |
| Marc Guéhi (£6.0m) | Competing with Gvardiol, Dias and Koulibaly for a centre-back spot under a manager who rotates constantly | almost 24% |
| Pedro Porro | Extended summer break, only back in training this week, with Spence or Archie Gray expected to start | 23% |
Guéhi and Porro are the two to stop on, because a quarter of the game owns each. Nobody is saying either player is bad. The argument is that you are paying a starter’s price for minutes you cannot count on, which is a different thing.
The pre-season hero problem
The other trap that kept coming up has no name attached to it, because the name changes every August. Someone scores a hatful in friendlies, the bandwagon forms, and nobody stops to ask who the opposition was or how hard anyone was trying.
A manager who finished 837th last season made the point bluntly on one podcast: what is still to come matters more than points that have already been scored. His draft is almost entirely players with a Premier League record behind them. Emiliano Buendía is this summer’s test case. He has looked genuinely good for Villa in pre-season, and a midfielder tier list still hesitated over him on the grounds that he has not produced in FPL since his Norwich days.
Minutes before upside
The most repeated warning of the week was about rotation risk, and specifically about talking yourself into a cheap new signing or a youngster who you have decided will nail down a spot. The pattern is always the same: they start Gameweek 1, they are on the bench by Gameweek 2, and you have burned a transfer fixing it.
The 4.5m midfield bracket is where this bites hardest. A tier list that went through the ten most-owned options at that price put most of them in the bottom tier, on the basis that nobody expects them to play. Everton’s number nine spot is the same coin flip in a different position: Beto has had a poor pre-season and Barry has looked the better of the two, but the pecking order has flipped repeatedly before.
The traps nobody agrees on
Two picks got called traps this week and then defended in the same breath, which is a useful reminder that “trap” often just means “a pick I did not make”.
Dominic Calvert-Lewin at £6.0m is the loudest one. The case against: two decent seasons in a whole career, and somehow he is now essential. The case for: it has been three seasons, the last one brought 14 goals, and there is very little at £6.0m or below that does what he does. The answer that came back was the sensible one. Nobody is essential for Gameweek 1, so if you do not fancy him, do not pick him.
Szoboszlai at £7.0m got the same treatment. The knock is that he lacks real goal threat and does not carry Bruno’s assist numbers, and that a slow accumulator is the wrong shape of player for the sprint between now and your first wildcard. The pushback came from someone who agreed with most of that and is starting with him anyway: he is not essential, but the alternatives at that price are not obviously better either.
The traps that are not players at all
Four habits came up more often than any individual pick, and they are the ones that quietly cost more.
Booking in transfers is the big one. Deciding now that you will sell Cunha for Semenyo in Gameweek 3 feels organised, but it leaves you nowhere to go when the injury you did not see coming turns up instead. Keep the plan rough.
Then there is the dead bench. Two bench boosts are available this season and one has to go in the first half, so saving money on four players who will never start is not really a saving.
Chasing differentials is the third. Ownership is not the target, points are, and being different in the second week of August is mostly a way to end up different and wrong.
The last one is price structure. Szoboszlai at £7.0m is the example people reach for, because directly beneath him sits a deep pool of £6.5m and £6.0m midfielders. Buy a player at a price with nothing underneath it and a bad start turns into a hit.
None of this makes the template a trap. It just means every name in your squad should have a reason attached that survives someone asking about it.
Once the season starts, the quickest way to find out which of these calls actually mattered is to watch the managers around you. You can search any FPL manager and follow their picks week by week.